Black Jade. David Zindell

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ

      ‘Morjin!’ I cried out, yet again. ‘Morjin!’

      I could not get at him. Swords flashed in front of me like a steel fence. I howled out my rage at being thwarted. Atara, wandering the battlefield blindly as she felt her way over rocks or dead bodies with the tip of her useless bow, moved closer to me, perhaps drawn by the sound of my voice. She held her unused saber in her hand, and I knew that she would fight to her death to try to protect me. Two of the Red Knights, like jackals, moved in on her to take advantage of her sightlessness. But I moved even more quickly. I cleaved the first of these knights through the helm, and the second I split open with a thrust through his chest. He died burning with a lust to lay his hands about Atara’s throat and drag this helpless woman down into darkness with him.

      I fell mad then. I threw myself at the Red Knights and the Zayak warriors, who were slowly retreating over the swells of ground that flowed down to the grasslands of the Wendrush. I cursed and gnashed my teeth and howled like a wolf; I struck out with my fearsome sword, again and again, at arms, bellies, throats, and faces. Steel shrieked and terrible cries split the air. Hacked and headless men dropped before me. The living, in ones and twos, began to break and run. One of the knights threw down his sword and begged for quarter. In my killing frenzy, however, I could not hear his words or perceive the surrender in his eyes. I sent him on without pity, and then another and yet another. And then, suddenly, no more of the enemy remained standing near me – only Kashak, Maram and Kane, who were gasping for breath and spattered with blood. Kashak’s warriors, the few who hadn’t fallen, gathered behind us, with the remaining Manslayers and Atara.

      ‘They’re getting away!’ Kane shouted at me. He pointed his bloody sword out toward the open steppe. ‘He is getting away … again!’

      Morjin’s four paladins, I saw, were grouped around their lord, and their horses galloped over the swaying grasses, away from the mountains. They were already far out on the Wendrush, to the east. The Red Knights and the few Zayak who had survived the slaughter had mounted their horses and hurried after them, soon to be joined by the Zayak who had ridden against Bajorak.

      ‘He won’t get away!’ I shouted. ‘Let us ride after him!’

      Our horses, however, were nowhere near at hand. Bajorak ran down from the ridge then and came up to us. He said, ‘Six of my men have fallen and four of Kashak’s. And six of the Manslayers. We are only thirty, now.’

      He went on to tell that we had slain some thirty of the Red Knights and all but two of the Zayak who had followed Morjin up the stream. With the Zayak that Bajorak’s men had felled with arrows, we had accounted for more than fifty of our enemy.

      ‘But they still outnumber us,’ Bajorak told me. ‘And if we pursue them, there will be no surprise.’

      ‘I don’t care!’

      ‘Morjin has the distance now!’

      ‘Growing greater by the moment, as we stand here!’

      ‘There may be other companies, other Red Knights and Zayak,’ Bajorak told me. ‘We have a victory. Morjin might not survive the wound you dealt him. You’re free to complete your quest.’

      ‘I don’t care!’ I shouted again. I pointed my flaming sword toward the east. ‘There is our enemy!’

      Bajorak slowly shook his head. ‘I will not pursue him. And neither will my warriors.’

      ‘It is Morjin!’ I shouted in rage. ‘And so he will survive, to kill and crucify again!’

      So hot did the fire swirling about my sword grow that Bajorak stepped away from me, and so did Kashak. But Kane, with a terrible wildness in his eyes, pointed toward Morjin racing away from us and shouted, ‘He won’t survive, damn him! Kill him, Val! You know the way!’

      As I met eyes with Kane, we walked together through a land burning up in flames. And yet, despite the fire and the terrible heat, it was a dark land, as black and hideous as charred flesh.

      ‘Kill him!’ Kane called out as he pointed at Morjin. ‘He is weak, now! This is your chance!’

      In my hands I held a sword that flared hotter and hotter as I stared out at Morjin’s shrinking form. Fire burned my face and built to a raging inferno inside me. I held there another sword, finer and yet even more terrible. It was pure lightning, all the fury and incandescence of the stars. With it I had slain Ravik Kirriland. I knew that I had only to strike out with this sword of fire and light to slay Morjin now.

      ‘So – kill him! Kill him! Kill him! Kill him!’

      Father! I cried out silently. Mother! Nona! Asaru!

      ‘No, Val!’ Atara called out to me, stumbling across the uneven ground. She found her way to my side and laid her hand on my shoulder. ‘Not this way!’

      ‘Do it!’ Kane howled at me.

      Could I slay Morjin with the valarda, of my own will? Could I tell a thunderbolt where to strike?

      ‘He is getting away, damn it! You are letting him get away!’

      No, a voice inside me whispered. No, no, no.

      ‘Kill him, now!’

      ‘No, I won’t!’ I howled back at Kane.

      ‘He crucified your own mother!’

       MORJINNN!

      I cried out this name with all the agony of my breath, like a blast of fire. My hate for Morjin swelled to the point where I could not control it, where I did not want to control it. Could I stop a whirlwind from blowing? No, I could not, and so finally the lightning tore me open. I felt all my evil rage flash straight out toward the tiny, retreating figure of Morjin as he galloped across the open grasslands. But it was too late. The sword of wrath, I sensed, struck him and stunned him, but did not kill. I watched helplessly as he made his escape toward the curving edge of the world.

      ‘It is too far!’ Kane shouted at me. ‘You waited too long!’

      I bowed my head in shame that I had failed to kill Morjin – and in even greater shame that, in the perversion of my sacred gift, I almost had.

      ‘Damn him!’ Kane shouted.

      I lowered my sword and watched as its flames slowly quiesced. With a ringing of silustria against steel, I slid it back into its sheath.

      And then I turned to Kane and said, ‘If I can help it, I won’t use the valarda to slay.’

      He stared at me for a moment that seemed to last longer than the turning of the earth into night. His eyes were like hell to look upon. And he shouted at me: ‘You won’t? Then it is you who are damned!’

      He watched as Morjin’s red form vanished into the shimmering nothingness of the horizon. Then he threw his hands up to the sky, and stalked off up the stream where the dead lay like a carpet leading to a realm that none would wish to walk.

      Neither Bajorak nor Kashak, nor even Karimah, understood what had transpired between us, for they knew little of the nature of my gift. But they realized that they had witnessed СКАЧАТЬ